Shumba Energy gets P800m solar plant approval
Upcoming energy developer, Shumba Energy, has secured approval for a 100MW solar power plant it intends on spending about $80 million (P880 million) in developing in the Tati area.
BusinessWeek has learnt the company, which has extensive coal licences in eastern Botswana, has positioned the solar project as its number one priority and plans to secure funding for the first 50MW phase within the next six months.
Shumba Energy CEO, Mashale Phumaphi told BusinessWeek the plant, which will sit on a 300-hectare area near Francistown, will target the Southern African Power Pool (SAPP), the region’s common marketplace for electricity.
The region has been facing a power deficit for years and while several projects are in the pipeline in different countries, Shumba Energy’s plant will be the first solar development targetted at the region at that scale.
“I would think it’s a good opportunity and one of the issues we are trying to address is that traditionally the different countries have been relying on utilities to do procurement for new power generation and in turn, the utilities have relied on giving out government-backed power purchase agreements,” Phumaphi said on Monday.
“One of the biggest issues with this approach is that government has to keep on giving out guarantees for these large scale projects and it means the government has less financial resources for other parts of the economy. “It would not be a problem if the power purchase agreements were for seven years or so, but these projects are usually for 15 to 20 years, which can be quite cumbersome and most of the utilities in the region are not in a good financial state.”
He added: “We feel there’s an opportunity to take the power shortage head-on and try to supply into the pool or market where there are a number of existing customers and where there is always a market.”
Currently, different electricity utilities in the region can sell power in the SAPP, which operates as a real-time market to make spare generation available and plug deficits. Shumba Energy expects to enter into an arrangement with the Botswana Power Corporation for the use of its network in exporting power into the SAPP.